Are dogs better protected than kids?

HANDS up. How many of us will feel deprived if we don't have an hour of Cameron and Miliband knocking lumps off each other in a pre-election TV debate? And how many will feel relieved?

AS Nick Clegg pledges support for the Cornish language, Claire Moody, Labour MEP for the South West declares: "The Cornish language is a vital part of the heritage of Cornwall and it's very important that we preserve it, and hopefully encourage it." Nonsense. If it was vital, people would speak it. If Cornwall wishes to celebrate its separateness from England, it should do it without English taxes.

INCIDENTALLY, what's a Clegg pledge likely to be worth after May 7? Half a Cornish pasty, if you're lucky.

IMAGINE this. In the 1960s your beloved son, brother or husband was caught in a police sting in a public lavatory and fined for indecent homosexual behaviour. It was the worst moment in his life. He moved house, moved jobs, moved on and died a few years ago. The family did its best to forget what had happened. And then suddenly politicians announce plans for a full pardon for all the men, like your relative, who were convicted of the sort of charges brought against the code-buster Alan Turing, as played by Benedict Cumberbatch in the film The Imitation Game. Turing was formally pardoned a few years ago. Those who wish to be pardoned can already apply to the Home Office. But Labour's plan is to extend the "Turing's Law" pardon process to those who have died and whose friends or relatives want a pardon. It is a can of worms, an unholy meddling in family life. What if a friend wants the pardon but the dead man's family are desperate to keep the past quiet? What if the family are terrified of publicity but a gay-rights group insists on demanding a pardon? The scope for heartache is enormous. For thousands of families, the best and kindest option would be for politicians simply to do nothing. But when did you last meet a politician who could resist the urge to meddle?

I CANNOT think of a worse case of child murder than that of little Ayeshi Ali, tortured to death by her mother who was groomed and directed by her lesbian lover, a thoroughly evil control freak. And yet although the wickedness was unbelievable, the long, painful saga of Ayeshi's decline and death was horribly familiar. We have seen it time after time. After every such horror, we are assured that lessons have been learned.

AYESHI was not killed overnight. Over a period of months she was beaten, given cold baths, bitten and force-fed until she was sick When she died she weighed just three-and-a-half stone. This happened not in some Third World village but to a child growing up and attending a school in Essex. Social services were not involved. Teachers were concerned about the child becoming withdrawn. Neighbours heard screams. Many alarm bells should have been ringing. They were not. And even as we recoil in horror from what happened to this poor mite, we know it is happening elsewhere, again and again. The only lesson we learn is that the lessons are never learned.

MEANWHILE, at about the time Ayeshi's murder was coming to court, a guide-dog organisation spotted that one of its pooches was getting overweight thanks to an over-indulgent owner. The dog was removed temporarily, put on a diet, given twice-daily walks by a friend of mine who supports the charity, and is now back in fine shape. If only our child-protection system worked as well as the one that protects labradors.